


Kristy and the Haunted Camp Adventure

by escritoireazul



Category: Baby-Sitters Club - Ann M. Martin
Genre: Extra Treat, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Ghost Hunting, High School, Trick or Treat: Chocolate Box, Trick or Treat: Trick
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-31
Updated: 2017-10-31
Packaged: 2019-01-19 21:10:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,978
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12418230
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/escritoireazul/pseuds/escritoireazul
Summary: Things Kristy Thomas doesn't believe:That ghosts are real.That she'll manage to have any fun adventures senior year because she's so stressed about what comes next.That she and Cary Retlin can ever be anything more than pseudo-friends.When Dawn convinces them to explore an abandoned, maybe haunted, summer camp over fall break, Kristy just might have to reevaluate everything.





	Kristy and the Haunted Camp Adventure

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lionessvalenti](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lionessvalenti/gifts).



It was all Dawn’s idea, of course, but Mary Anne made it happen. That’s what she did best, take a great idea and tweak the details until it worked. And how it worked was like this: Dawn wanted to have one last big adventure with us and explore an old, abandoned summer camp that was supposed to be haunted. (Three main options, she said: kid who drowned in the lake; Girl Scouts or maybe Rainbow Girls or maybe some school group, but whoever they were, a handful disappeared into the trees for three or six or nine long nights; some guy had watched too many slasher movies and set about making a name for himself only to die early and unfulfilled. Not a single one was believable.) Mary Anne wanted Dawn to be happy, so she talked me into it.

Why Alan and Cary ended up coming along, I wasn’t quite sure.

Well, besides the fact that Mary Anne and Alan were in their on-again phase, and Cary and Alan were still pretty good friends. Not that I could make fun of them for that, considering Mary Anne had been my best friend since before we could walk, and Mary Anne and Dawn had been friends since middle school.

It was a little complicated, all the ways everyone connected. That’s a small town for you, even though we were near enough to both a big city and _the_ city that we shouldn’t act like a small town.  

Me? Kristy Thomas; I was seventeen and a senior at Stoneybrook High School in Stoneybrook, Connecticut. I’d been the shortest girl in our grade since we were twelve, and one of the youngest, too. My birthday was in August, so I wouldn’t be eighteen until right before I started college. Most of my friends turned eighteen during our senior year.

My family was big and blended and boisterous. (Wasn’t that a great word? I thought it sounded better than loud and obnoxious, which plenty of people called us.) I grew up with two older brothers and a younger brother, then when my mom remarried back in middle school, I got two younger step-siblings, and shortly after, we adopted a little girl. It didn't really matter how we were legally related, though. They were my sisters and brothers, and that was that.

My two oldest brothers were off at college, and the brother and sister from my step-dad’s first marriage only lived with us every other month, so the house felt empty a lot of the time, even though when we were all together, we crowded it full. That was quite a feat, because it was a mansion, and we barely even used the third floor. Still, we were boisterous enough (or, you know, loud enough) to fill it with noise and activity when we were all home, and I missed that. Thanksgiving break couldn’t come soon enough each year.

Mary Anne Spier had been my very best friend since we were toddlers. Until my mom remarried, I lived next door to her, and I still smiled whenever I drove past those houses, even though neither of us had lived there in years. In a lot of ways, we were complete opposites: I was loud and bold, she was quiet and shy; I loved sports and though I didn’t hate reading, I had a hard time sitting still, she got bored any time there was a hint of physical activity and would rather have her nose in a book ninety-nine percent of the time; I came up with Great Ideas, and she made them happen.

We were alike in even more important ways: we were opinionated, smart, and driven; we had done great things already and would only get better when we were adults; we loved our families; and we loved each other.

Mary Anne and I first met Dawn Schafer when we were in the seventh grade. She was the new girl that winter, come all the way from southern California with her newly-divorced mom and her younger brother, and boy, did she have a lot of adjusting to do. Not just the cold, dark weather after all that sun and warmth, either. She was a vegetarian who loved health food and hated red meat, and was laid back most of the time (though she was strident when it comes to saving the environment). She still didn’t understand our “fast talking, fast walking, time obsessed east coast ways.” (That was, I’m sure you can tell, a direct quote from a visit junior year.) That was part of why she moved back to California to live with her dad less than a year later.

Before she did, though, she and Mary Anne figured out that Mary Anne’s dad and Dawn’s mom had been high school sweethearts and got them back together. (Mary Anne’s mom died when she was just a baby, and though she knew her dad loved her, she grew up in a quiet, sad little house.)

Even though Dawn had been back in California much longer than she ever lived here, she was still Mary Anne’s other best friend. (I used to be jealous of that. Sometimes I still was. Mostly, though, I understood that Mary Anne could be best friends with both of us without it having to be a competition. I was good at competition, though. I loved to win.)

Alan had been around forever, too, mostly as an annoyance who needed to be squashed out of our lives. Most of our group of friends had gone on at least one date with him, including me if you counted casual dances as a date. (I didn’t. Most people did.) But last year, he and Mary Anne started going out, and it got serious pretty fast. (Mary Anne didn’t really date casually. Even back in eighth grade, when she was the first of us to have a boyfriend, she was more serious with him than some of us have been when we’ve dated in high school.) Serious or not, they had an on-again, off-again relationship. Just my luck they were back on for the trip.

Alan was still annoying a lot of the time, but I put up with him for Mary Anne’s sake. He wasn’t quite as bad as he used to be, or maybe he was on his best behavior around Mary Anne, or maybe I just didn’t notice him as much because one of his friends had taken over the Obnoxious Jerk role in my life.

Cary Retlin.

He was one of the sneakiest and cleverest guys I’ve ever met, and I wanted to hate him. Sometimes, I even managed it, when he played a particularly terrible prank on me or my friends. Most of the time, though, I found him endlessly entertaining. It was horrible.

Obnoxious or not, when he wasn’t annoying me, he made even the best situation even better. Pranks and stories were his strengths. A day exploring a haunted summer camp would be his bread and butter. Though I grumbled to Mary Anne about it, by the time we picked up Alan and Cary, I wasn’t really annoyed anymore that the boys came with us.

Mary Anne and Dawn told their parents they were spending the night with me, and they were, but what Mr. Spier especially didn’t need to know was that Mom and Watson were in the city for the night, some big work celebration, and wouldn’t be back until late. David Michael was old enough to take care of Emily Michelle, and he’d never noticed if we came in past curfew. Even if he did, I’d been a big sister for a long time. I knew exactly the right combo of bribery and guilt and blackmail to use to get him to keep my secrets, just like Charlie and Sam had done for me.

I was the oldest sibling at home, at least for the next year. (I refused to think about what came after that.) It definitely had its perks.  
  
*  
  
We met the guys near the Rosebud Cafe. There was enough street parking that Alan could leave his car there all day and all night without it standing out, and if anyone _did_  ask about it, he’d say he had car trouble. His car was crappy enough it might even be true. We all fit inside my SUV, but the backseat was kind of a tight fit; Dawn sat in the passenger seat next to me, and Alan squeezed in between Mary Anne and Cary. Cary sat behind me, and sometimes I caught him smirking when I glanced in the rear view mirror.

The old summer camp was only a few hours away, but we wanted plenty of time to explore, so we left in the morning. We put a cooler in the back stocked with soda and water, and the boys brought a couple bags of snacks, chips and cookies and beef jerky. (Dawn, a long-time vegetarian, brought her own food: carrots, peppers, and hummus, frozen grapes, and a giant reusable mug of ice water.)

(We had chocolate, graham crackers, and marshmallows too, along with what we’d need to start a little campfire. Blankets and a couple tarps just in case.)

The sun was bright, the sky clear, and it was unseasonably warm when we left. Mary Anne made a series of mixtapes for us with everyone’s favorite songs. (She was the only one who not only knew the right music for each of us but was organized enough to make it happen. I could organize things when I wanted to, but I would have recorded one with my songs and been done with it. If they wanted music, they could make some themselves.)

It was too noisy to drive on the interstate with the windows open, but once we pulled off onto a highway that ran straight through a bunch of small towns, we rolled the windows all the way down. Dawn muttered about global warming, but that didn’t stop her from hooking her arm over the edge of the door and tilting her face into the sun; the wind caught her long blonde hair and tossed it back into our faces.

I glanced into the mirror and found Cary smirking at me again. Mary Anne had her head on Alan’s shoulder and her face turned toward the window. She was smiling out at nothing, and the light gilded her skin. Her brown hair was permed and cut too short to pull back; she wore a headband to try to tame it, but brown curls tangled around her ears.

“What are we listening to?” Cary grumbled. “It’s gross.”

It was some boy band, and I didn’t want to admit that I agreed with him, but he was right. The music itself was bland, but I could survive that. The lyrics were terrible, repetitive and cheesy, and if I had to listen to them for another second, I would gouge out my own ears.

“I like it,” Mary Anne said, her voice louder and sharper than normal. Cary brought out the worst in people without even trying. Or the best. And maybe he was trying.

“You liked Cam Geary sings,” I muttered.

“You promised not to tell anyone that!” Mary Anne squealed and shoved my shoulder. It made me jerk the wheel a little, we swerved in the lane, and next to me, Dawn jolted, like she’d fallen asleep despite the noise and rush of air across her face.

I snorted. “Like anyone in this car hasn’t heard you singing along to it.”

Mary Anne settled back into her seat with a humph. I caught Cary smiling as my eyes flickered to the mirror to check on Mary Anne. I jerked my eyes back to the road.

“Even if she’s telling secrets, maybe don’t attack the driver,” Dawn suggested. “I, for one, want to live long enough to see the camp.” She gathered her hair up in both hands and twisted it into a sloppy bun.

“Oh.” Mary Anne leaned forward again and put her hand on my shoulder. “Sorry, Kristy.”

I laughed. “What’s a little violence among friends?”

Cary said something, but I couldn’t make it out over the rush of air. Alan shook his head, slammed his elbow into Cary’s side. Mary Anne settled back against him, and he put his arm around her.

We drove on into the golden sunshine. Dawn’s ghost stories felt very far away.  
  
*  
  
Dawn sat cross-legged on the ground, holding a tape recorder in one hand, her hair a long, sleek sheet of a yellow so pale it was almost white. The ends pooled on the ground behind her, but somehow it remained clean of leaves or dirt.

I pointed the video camera at her. It wasn’t quite as fancy as the one Watson had bought us last Christmas, but easy enough to use. She looked up at me, straight into the camera. She wore no makeup, and her eyes glowed a startling bright blue against her tanned skin.

“I’m Dawn Schafer,” she said, as calm and casual as ever even in front of the camera. “And I’m here to walk you through Camp Clear Lake.” Both hands rested loosely on her knees, and she didn’t fidget. Both the tape recorder and the video camera should pick her up nice and clear. “It hasn’t been used as a summer-long camp since the 1980s, but up until last year, it was used for short events, weekend retreats, week-long Girl Scout trips, things like that.

Why did the owners abandon it last year? There are plenty of rumors, but no one knows for sure.” She flashed a wide smile for the camera. “That’s why I’m here. I’m looking for answers, and I’m going to take you along for the ride.”

She stopped for a moment, let silence settle over us. Even Alan and Cary were quiet. The wind rustled the leaves on the tree branches, and hidden bugs making a high-pitched noise. She took a deep breath.

“Something happened here. Maybe nothing big. Maybe something terrible.” She shrugged, and even that looked cool and casual. “Whatever it was, you’ll see everything I see, hear everything I hear. If I can’t figure it out, maybe you can.”

She blew the camera a kiss. “This is for you, Mia.” Sitting there in the sunlight, beaming at the camera, she absolutely glowed, and we glowed with her.

Whatever story she was going to tell future viewers -- her girlfriend, her friends back in California, other ghost hunters, maybe even the indie film circuit, she _did_ live near L.A. -- she made me happy to be a part of it.  
  
*  
  
The biggest building was actually made of logs, but the smaller buildings, the cabins for the campers and the counselors, just looked like they were. We walked a big circuit first thing, making sure we got everything on camera. Dawn carried it for this part, and stopped every so often to pan around slowly.

“Filming while walking gets shaky,” she told me when I asked. “This gets all the details.”

“The boring details!” Cary cried, tilting his head back toward the sky. “You promised me ghosts.”

“I did no such thing,” Dawn said, and for a moment, she sounded as prim as Mary Anne could be.

“Well someone did.”

I laughed. “It’s not our fault you listened to _Alan_.”

“Hey!” Alan spun toward us. “What’d I do?”

That set us all to laughing. For no reason, really. Just giddiness over being somewhere we weren’t supposed to be, for doing something we weren’t supposed to do, for being alive and outside and full of sugar and caffeine. (Well, some of us were. Dawn, of course, hadn’t touched any of the coffee, soda, or donuts we’d grabbed on the way.)

Once we had a quick, but decent, understanding of the layout, we found the best place to build a campfire. There was even an old stone circle for it behind the main building, with a big circle of bare ground around it. I thought the campers must have gathered there at night to tell stories and sing songs and do all the silly things I’d done at summer camp.

We lit the fire even though it was still daylight. Gathered enough wood for it to last for hours. Better to do it now, I said, than to stumble around in the dark when we ran out, and everyone went along with my decision. They usually did.

When it was my turn to record, Dawn had me sit with my back to the fire. At that angle, she said sunlight fell across my face just right. All I cared was that it didn’t make me squint when I took off my sunglasses like she asked.

I introduced myself, and Dawn went through some basic questions about who I was and what I thought about the stories.

“It’s sad someone died here,” I told her. It was hard to look at the camera rather than her face; she held it in front of her and down a little, checking the viewfinder every so often, but mostly watching me over it. “But people will forget about it eventually. Telling stories just keeps the memory alive, I guess. If you don’t talk about it, you can pretend it didn’t happen or that it goes away.”

I hadn’t meant to say that, not exactly.

“Not talking about it doesn’t help though, not really, does it?” she asked.

I shrugged, uncomfortable. Forced myself to keep staring at the camera instead of looking away like I wanted to do. I could just make out my reflection in the lens. She waited out my silence, though. Once, she would have rushed to fill it.

We all grew up in different ways.

“I guess not,” I said at last. “But sometimes people just want to feel better.”  
  
*  
  
We made a late lunch out of all our snack food. It was a lot of sugar and grease, and by the end, I found myself eyeing Dawn’s veggies. The day I admitted she had a point about healthy food was the day I gave up softball, though, so instead I ate another handful of trail mix. It was mostly nuts, anyway. Not a lot of chocolate. Not as much as a candy bar, anyway.

When we were done, Dawn sat down with Alan. (Mary Anne made sure he wiped off the chocolate smeared across the corner of his mouth. It would have been funnier if she’d left him alone.)

Again, introduction, brief conversation. Then she got to the meat of his questions.

“One of the stories is that the last group here were girl scouts, and a whole group of them followed noises into the trees and disappeared for three days. When they were finally found, none of them remembered what had happened to them, where they’d been. All they knew was that there was a voice, calling them. Telling them things. Something different for each of them, or at least that’s what people think. They were confused and groggy when they were found.” She smiled at him, steady and interested. She made a good reporter. “What would lure you into the woods?”

“Not a damn thing,” he said. “I’ve seen too many horror movies.” We laughed, and he beamed into the camera.  
  
*  
  
Not all of the buildings were locked. The main building was, but the back door was loose, and it was easy to work it open. Inside was boring, though. It had been stripped clean. Even some of the walls were torn open and the wiring pulled out.

The cabins were a little more interesting. They still had bunkbeds, and looked untouched by whoever had gone through the main building. Not by animals, though. There were animal droppings in all the ones we explored, and in the last one, we actually found an old nest in the middle of one of the mattresses.

Dawn recorded in each, but clearly wasn’t interested.

“What were you hoping to find?” I asked.

She handed Mary Anne the camera, then came to stand next to me. “I don’t go in looking for anything in particular,” she said. She looked at me and not the camera, so I did the same. “I don’t want to bias myself.”

She was plenty biased already, I thought, but I had gained some small level of control over my big mouth and held it in.

“But you have to have some ideas,” I pressed.

“Of course. Everyone does. Depends on the story. The kids who wandered out into the woods, did they leave something behind, written on the walls? Is there salt where there shouldn’t be salt? Cold spots? Weird noises?” She shrugged. “It’s like what the movies say and not at the same time.”

Now she turned to the camera. “We haven’t found anything yet. Not here, not the other places we’ve looked. Some of you have seen the recordings. Even when strange things happen, we’ve been able to find some sort of logical theory as to what caused them. But that doesn’t mean we’re going to stop looking.”  
  
*  
  
Cary flashed a wide smile for the camera. “I don’t believe in no ghosts,” he half sang.

“I’m not surprised,” Dawn said. “Your dad was a cop. You’ve grown up looking for the normal, rational answer for everything. You can’t help it.”

That wiped the smile off his face.

“Damn, Dawn,” I said, sotto voce. “Don’t be cruel.”

She started, glanced at me, then seemed to replay her words in her head. “I’m sorry, Cary,” she told him at last. “Let’s try this again, okay?”

He gave her a tight nod; when his gaze met mine, I saw the faintest twitch of his mouth, gone before I could decide if it was a real smile.  
  
*  
  
Mary Anne fidgeted with her hair, kept stealing glances at me. “Do I have to?” she asked Dawn.

“No.” Dawn put her arm across Mary Anne’s shoulders. “But I’d really like it if you did.”

She nodded, jerky. “Okay,” she said, then again. “Okay.” She was the last of us to sit down in front of the camera, and the light was almost gone, but Dawn was patient. More patient than she used to be. High school was good for her. I didn’t think I’d be so calm.

“Sit anywhere you’d like,” Dawn said. “I want you to be comfortable for this.”

I pressed my lips tight together so I wouldn’t laugh. Mary Anne, comfortable on camera? Not likely. But she was a good sport when her friends had some sort of wacky plans. She always had been. Probably, she always would be.

For a moment, I wondered if we’d still be friends then. In five years. Ten. Twenty. My future loomed ahead of me, and no matter how many times my mom and Watson talked about what a bright future it would be, I couldn’t see anything in it. There were many unknowns, too many ways things were going to change as soon as we graduated. Were already changing.

That was the last thing I wanted to think about. I left Mary Anne giving a shaky introduction in front of the camera and wandered off among the buildings.  
  
*  
  
Darkness came over the camp all at once, much faster than I expected. Maybe it was the tall trees that surrounded the camp. Only some of them were deciduous, their leaves turned orange and yellow and a bright red that had gleamed against the setting sun. The rest were coniferous, vibrant dark greens and long branches that jutted out over the buildings. All the trees cast long shadows, and night was on me before I noticed the light was going, going, gone.

Though the camp had looked safe, if not welcoming, in the daylight, now that it was completely dark, everything changed. All the color was washed out of the trees, and the light from the campfire behind me flickered even this far into the buildings, making shadows flicker and twitch.

The cool air that had felt so good while we explored was now chilly and damp and seeped through my sweatshirt and jeans. Goosebumps rose along my skin; I pulled my sleeves down over my hands. (Most of my sweatshirts were too long like that anyway, and I spent a lot of time pushing the sleeves up my forearms. I had bulked up a little during high school, but I was still short, arms and legs compact, and buying clothes that actually fit sucked. And was, sometimes, impossible. Good thing I still didn’t care about how I looked.)

I headed back toward the fire, wanting to warm my hands and get something to drink, but I must have gotten turned around somehow. I passed more small cabins than I remembered, and I didn’t get closer to the campfire.

I stopped, tried to get my bearings. The camp wasn’t that big, and I didn’t believe in the things that go bump in the night. I hadn’t stepped into some kind of weird vortex or been led astray by a ghost. I was good with directions, but I could get lost, even in a place like this. It wasn’t a big deal. But still I’d wandered, surrounded by empty buildings and distant trees and dim starlight, followed by shadows that moved uncannily.

Something cold and wet settled on the back of my neck; I shrieked and slammed my elbow backward even as I jumped forward.

Whatever was behind me grunted. _Whatever_ ? That was ridiculous. _Whoever_ was behind me grunted, because that was a human touch and a human noise, because I didn’t believe in anything else.

I spun around and found Cary half doubled over, one arm pressed against his stomach, the other holding a bottle of water.

“Damn, Thomas, you didn’t need to do that.”

“Me?” I cried. “You scared the crap out of me.” The minute I said it, I wish I’d kept my big mouth shut.

“Easy to do,” he said. His voice was still tight, and he kept his arm over his stomach, but he straightened and looked me straight in the eyes. “You should have seen yourself, staring around like you’d met a ghost.”

 I made a show of rolling my eyes. “I was not.”

 He laughed, his smile wide. “Yes you were. ‘Oh help me, I’ve lost my way.’” He pressed the back of his hand dramatically to his forehead. “‘Woe, woe is me.’”

 “When have you ever heard me talk like that?” I snapped. “When have you ever heard _anyone_ talk like that?”

 “Artistic license,” he said.

“Asshole license,” I responded, and he laughed again. This time, I was laughing too, though. “What are you doing out here?”

He shrugged. “Got bored. Dawn’s talking to her camera again, and Alan and Mary Anne are cuddling for warmth.” His expression twisted. “It’s pretty gross.”

I shook my head at him, but couldn’t disagree. She could get awfully lovey dovey sometimes.

Silence settled over us for a long moment. I curled my hands into fists, trying to warm my fingers. Glanced around at the cabins surrounding us. Considered making my way back to the fire, but something kept me standing there with him.

“What do you think happened?” he asked. I started, not prepared for him to speak.

“The sun went down. It happens every day.” I raised my eyebrows. “Surely you’ve been in Stoneybrook long enough to learn basic science.”

He made a face at me. It was a childish thing to do, but it made me laugh anyway. “I know how the sun works,” he said. “What do you think happened _here_?”

“Rich people abandoning things when they’re old and worn down, just like they always do.” I popped it of without really thinking about. If I had, I might not have said it. Watson was great, and I loved him. And some of my rich neighbors were decent, too. I even had friends in the neighborhood. But down deep, I still had that distrust of rich people that came from growing up in a small house with a single parent.

Cary opened his mouth, but before he could say anything, I rushed to add, “A kid died. It’s hard to come back from that.”

He nodded. “Even when it’s an accident.”

There was a sad tone to his words, and I wondered, yet again, what other secrets he had. No matter much I learned about his past -- and it wasn’t like I really tried, I just picked things up here and there -- there were still things I didn’t know. None of us knew. Things we all thought made him act the way he did, sometimes using his intelligence for good and sometimes to torment the people around him, but things we didn't know and would probably never learn.

“Yeah. Maybe especially then. If it’s something else,” I couldn’t quite bring myself to say ‘murder’ but he knew what I meant, “people think there was something that could be done. It could have been stopped, if only.”

“If only they’d been smart enough or fast enough.”

I looked at him a moment. “Yes.” That was exactly what I’d been thinking. “It was preventable, and that means it can be stopped in the future. But an accident -- no matter how many precautions they take, an accident might happen again.”

“Murder might too. Once someone’s spilled blood, some people think it makes it even more tempting for the next murderer.”

“Well, that’s certainly creepy.”

He snorted, shook his head. “Sure.” Then, the smile gone, “Maybe I mean it that way.”

I punched his upper arm. “Now you’re just trying too hard.”

That silence settled over us again, somewhat awkward, but at the same time, not really. I tried to come up with something snarky to say, but my great snappy comebacks abandoned me. Maybe my brain was freezing. It was way colder than I’d expected it to be.

“Did you hear that?” he asked.

“Just you. God, you’re a loud breather.”

I expected him to say something witty to that, and maybe a little perverted -- at least I’d know how to respond to that, and shut him down, and go back to the campfire rather than standing there with him in the dark -- but he shook his head.

“No, seriously. Did you hear it?”

I shook my head.

“There it is again.” His voice dropped. “Over there.”

I frowned at him, but listened. At first, I heard nothing but both of us breathing, and my own heart beat, and the wind through the trees. There were no bug sounds, no crickets or whatever should be out this time of year.

And then I heard it: the very definite crunch of gravel.

“You heard that,” he told me before I could even say anything.

“I heard someone take a step.” I put my hands on my hips and glared at him. “Look, I know what you’re doing. You’re trying to freak me out. Is Dawn going to pop out with her camera if you make me scream?”

“I’m not doing anything!” he snapped, and his voice was back to normal volume.

“Yeah, right.”

“I’m not!” He glared at me. “If I was, I’d do something much cleverer than that, and you know it!”

He wasn’t wrong. Pretending to hear something scary and then have someone jump out at me was low level pranking. He’d been better than that even back in middle school.

However, Cary wasn’t alone here.

“Then Alan put you up to it.”

“Thomas, you know me better than that.”

My laugh was short and sharp. “I know you two encourage each other to be assholes. This may not be sophisticated and clever enough for you, but it’s right up his alley, and I know you’d go along with it.”

“I swear I’m not--” The sound of heavy footsteps approaching us fast shut him up. They were loud and oddly timed, like whoever it was kept hesitating, just for a second, to listen to something. To listen _for_ something.

To listen for us. Despite my bravado, I shivered.

It was easy to get scared, I told myself, alone with Cary in the dark, this far from the campfire. Understandable that all Dawn’s stories had gotten to me.

The footsteps kept coming, circling around the far side of the nearest cabin. Cary grabbed my arm, and without really thinking about it, I followed him, trying to walk as quietly as possible. Hoping the quiet sound of gravel crunching under our feet was drowned out by the other, louder footsteps.

Together, we stumbled up into the dark, heavily shadowed corner where two of the cabins sat close together. We hadn’t run far at all, but the rush of fear combined with the burst of fast, hard motion left me gasping for air.

“If this is one of your tricks, I’m going to strangle you,” I hissed.

“It’s not me!” Despite his whisper, his tone was adamant. “It doesn’t sound like any of the others, either. Didn’t you hear that heavy tread? No one here’s big enough to walk that hard.”

“Then who is it?”

He shrugged and shot me a helpless look. “The guy who killed all the campers?”

I swallowed my disgusted groan. “Oh, come on! That was just a story. He was a sad old man, and people were scared of him. The story itself says there wasn't enough evidence for anyone to be sure it was him. Or that it really happened at all.” It was a struggle to keep my voice quiet. “He’s dead anyway! Ghosts aren’t real! And even if they were, why would we hear _footsteps_?”

“Maybe he’s--”

The footsteps started around the cabin where we were hiding. Cary’s eyes flared wide, and he froze. This time, I grabbed him and dragged him away. I didn’t like running, but until I could see what was coming after us, until I said something to defend myself, I didn’t want to let anyone get close on their terms and not mine. I didn't believe in ghosts, especially ghosts that walked around, but someone was making those noises, and if it wasn't any of us, that meant some stranger was here. Maybe innocent. Maybe trying to scare us. 

Maybe ready to do us real harm.

I shoved Cary around the back of another cabin and then crouched next to the steps, hoping they would provide enough cover that I would be able to see whoever was walking around without them seeing me first. I kicked something as I moved, and nearly fell over a stick big enough my fingers barely wrapped around it when I grabbed it. It was heavier than my softball bat, and felt sturdy. I hoped it would help.

While I’d been talking to Cary -- or maybe darting between the cabins -- clouds had blown up. There was little light. I couldn’t even make out the campfire at this point, though maybe it was somewhere behind me, hidden at just the wrong angle. Still, I could make out the figure that walked up between two of the cabins.

It was tall, so much taller than even Alan, who was just over six feet, and the tallest one of us, and had wide shoulders. It wore a dark hat pulled low over its face and a long black coat that swirled around its legs even when the wind wasn’t blowing.

There was something off about it that I didn’t understand at first, but as I stared, hard, I finally got it: I could see the edge of the cabin through its body. It wasn’t translucent, exactly, but it was cloudy in places, insubstantial enough I could see through it. Then it would move, and that spot was gone, but another had appeared.

“Oh my god,” Cary whispered behind me, and its eyes snapped toward us. In less time than it took me to breathe in, it bounded across the short distance between the cabins and was on us, lashing out with something that flashed bright even in the darkness. A line of fire burned along my upper arm, and I shouted.

I scrambled to my feet and bolted. I’d always been fast off the block, and this time I startled Cary; he hadn’t yet moved, and I slammed into him hard enough to knock him into the wall. He cried out, I grabbed his arm and jerked him away from the cabin, and together we ran.

No matter how we dodged through the camp, I couldn’t see the campfire anywhere. Couldn’t hear any of the others. Didn’t dare shout for them, because it was somewhere behind us, and I didn’t want to give away where we were or where the others were, either.

The camp wasn’t that big, walking the perimeter earlier hadn’t taken long at all, but now it felt like it went on forever. Finally, Cary stumbled to a stop behind one of the cabins -- there had been twenty cabins when we arrived, but now I swore I’d counted to fifty before I stopped -- gasping for air. I swung back around to join him, even though I could have kept running, and he doubled over for a moment, braced his hands on thighs.

Thank god for softball and cross country, I thought. All I have to do is outrun him. And then I hated myself a little for thinking it. I was supposed to be good in an emergency, even one like this that was absolutely unbelievable.

I listened hard, but didn’t hear anything. Cary looked like he needed a break, anyway, so I slumped against the side of the cabin. My throat burned. I’d give almost anything for that bottle of water, even if it was warm now, but Cary had dropped it somewhere along the way.

My arm hurt. When I touched my fingers to it, they came away sticky. I was bleeding. It had cut me. It was -- it was -- my brain didn’t want to accept what I was experiencing. It was see-through at times and yet somehow corporal when it came time to hurt me. It moved so fast I hadn’t been able to get away from its knife, but hadn’t caught up with us. It made noise when it walked, but it had come out of nowhere.

I was about to die, and it was all Dawn’s fault.  
  
Cary pressed close to my side, breathing hard enough I was afraid someone would hear him and find us. I could feel him shaking where his arm pressed against mine. Despite the chilly night, the air between us was hot and sticky with sweat and fear.

Somewhere nearby, I heard something crunch, and Cary’s breath went ragged and louder still.

I clapped my hand over his mouth, his breath hot and damp against my palm.

“Be quiet,” I murmured against his ear. He nodded, jerky, and I saw the flash of white of his eyes as he glanced around. Another crunch, closer this time, and I froze, pressed against him. I could smell his sweat and the scent of whatever crap he smeared in his hair to make it so spiky.

The next noise was so close whoever made it should be right in front of us, but no one was there. My breath came out in a ragged gasp and I bit down hard on my lower lip, until I tasted blood. My heartbeat pounded in my ears until that was all I could hear. Anyone nearby would be able to hear it, too.

My eyes watered, my chest burned. I held my breath as long as I could, until the world spun and my vision went dark at the edges.

Then, just when I thought I’d pass out if I had to stay quiet a second longer, I could hear the footsteps walking off into the distance.

“Jesus,” Cary muttered against my palm. I realized, then, that his lips were soft, and I jerked my hand away from his mouth. It was a stupid thing to notice, but it made my cheeks heat. Good thing it was so dark. We could barely see each other, no way he’d be able to tell that I was blushing.

God, I wasn’t Mary Anne. Boys didn’t get to me like this. But maybe terror and being this close to a guy even I had to admit was kind of cute was --

Cary kissed me then, a gentle press of his mouth against mine. I brought my free hand up, intending to push him away -- this was  _not_ the time -- but then I fisted my hand in his flannel shirt and tugged him closer. Opened my mouth, touched my tongue to his lips.

He put his arms around me as I deepened the kiss, and we ended up pressed against the wall again, clinging to each other in the darkness, hidden, for the moment, from whatever stalked us through the empty buildings.

*  
  
“Kristy!” My name echoed through the camp, and I jerked away from Cary. He held tight to my arms, but his eyes were no longer wide and afraid, and the way I pressed against him had very little to do with fear.

Though --

“Shut up,” I muttered, knowing it was impossible for Mary Anne to hear me like that. “Shut up, shut up, shut up.”

“Kristy, where are you?”

I took off at a slow jog, Cary at my heels, trying to figure out where her voice was coming from. It bounced strangely off the buildings and was swallowed by the trees so that sometimes the echo died off sharp and sometimes it lingered until the name itself was gone and only the sound remained.

This place was weird.

I wanted to go home.

“Kristy?”

And then, nearby, I heard the crunch of gravel again. Without thinking, I swung toward it. Cary grabbed my arm, throwing me off balance, and we spun around in a tangled circle.

“What the fuck?” I snapped.

“That’s not her,” he whispered, terror writ large across his expression. “Too heavy.”

Oh god. Could it mimic her voice? Did it have her, making her shout for me? Where was everyone else? Were they all dead? The thoughts spun through my mind too fast to follow. More footsteps, to my right.

And then, Mary Anne’s voice, shouting my name, clearly to the left. For the first time in what felt like hours, I saw light. Not flickering firelight, but the flash of red that was brake lights. Mary Anne called for me again. Frantic. Afraid. But alive.

I grabbed Cary’s hand, and we ran.  
  
*  
  
Mary Anne stood next to my car. The back door on the driver’s side was open; Alan was behind the wheel. Dawn was with Mary Anne, one hand on her shoulder, the other holding that damn video camera. Her hair was a tangled mess down her back, and even at this distance, I could see a long cut down her left cheek.

“Kristy!” Mary Anne started toward me, but Dawn tugged her back. “Thank god, I thought--”

Her words choked off.

“Run!” Dawn bellowed and shoved Mary Anne toward the car. “Faster!”

I knew looking back was a terrible idea. I knew it, and I did it anyway. The thing was right behind us, slashing forward with its knife. It cut across my chest; I screamed in pain, with rage, and whirled to face it.

It thrust the knife at me. I blocked it with one arm, and the knife cut me open again, across the wound it had left earlier. Tears blurred my vision, but I pushed through the pain. Stepped back, gathered my strength. Swung that branch one-handed and threw all my weight behind it.

I might be able to see through part of it, but it was corporeal enough to hurt me. That meant I could hurt it, too.

The branch connected, cracked, and the jagged edge jabbed into its side. It staggered back, tearing the branch from my hand. I didn’t give it a chance to catch itself or come at me again. I spun around, lowered my head, and bolted for the car, driving my legs like pistons. I regularly ran six and seven minute miles. At the speed I was going, I might have been sub-five if I’d been able to keep it up.

Thank god, I didn’t have to run a mile. I hit the side of the car still at full speed and bounced backward. I would have fallen, except Mary Anne grabbed me and dragged me into the backseat. Cary and Dawn were already there, piled on top of each other.

Alan hit the gas the second my feet left the ground, and we careened out of the clearing, tires struggling for purchase on the loose gravel. I could feel it slap against my legs, but I didn’t care. That was better than staying behind. Anything would be better than that.

I started to slip back out of the car, and Dawn lunged over Mary Anne to help grab me and haul me inside. Her hands wrapped around the cuts on my arm. I ground my teeth together so I wouldn’t scream and startle them into letting go.

Finally, I was on the seat and could jerk the door closed behind me. The car skidded and slid as Pete drove faster and faster. No way I was going to tell him to stop.

We hit the paved road doing nearly sixty, and it was sheer luck that the road was clear. Pete nearly didn’t make the turn; he hit the brakes, the tires screamed, we rocked to the side, then spun, until we were facing the gravel road. Plumes of dust filled the air, and we froze, staring as it slowly settled.

Nothing came after us. The trees were still, the road empty. We were alone.

“What the fuck was that?” Mary Anne shouted at Dawn. The shock of hearing her curse was enough to make me choke on a laugh. I couldn’t stop it, or the next one, or the next, and soon I was laughing so hard tears filled my eyes. Alan started laughing next, and then Cary, and finally Mary Anne and Dawn did, too.

Our laughter sounded like sobbing if I thought about it too much, but I slumped against my best friend and let my fear go.  
  
*  
  
Once we started driving again, we didn’t stop until we found a gas station that had its bathroom around back. Mary Anne, Dawn, and I went in to get cleaned up. Only Dawn and I had actual cuts from the knife, but Mary Anne had skinned her palms during a fall, and Alan had dirt and bruises all over his face and arms.

The bathroom wasn’t very clean, but there was soap and hot water and paper towels. I could make do. I cleaned the cuts as best I could. The one across my chest was more of a scrape, just enough to burn, but the ones down my left arm were deep enough to bleed.

Mary Anne helped me wash them out while Dawn carefully cleaned dirt from the cut down her face. I expected Mary Anne to get squeamish over it, but she was a trooper and didn’t even have to look away.

Someone banged on the door, and all three of us jumped. Mary Anne clutched at my hand, eyes wide; Dawn clenched her fist around the paper towels she was holding. The banging came again, and she made her way to the door, standing well back as she eased it open.

“They had bandages inside,” Cary said, and walked in, shouldering past the door. Alan followed him, looking over his shoulder. Stood uncomfortable right in front of the door after Dawn shut it. “And peroxide.”

“That’ll help,” Mary Anne told him. She took the supplies from him. “Thanks.”

“Schafer,” Cary said while Mary Anne worked on my arm. “What the hell was that about?”

Dawn shook her head. “I don’t know!”

“This was your idea,” Mary Anne said. Her voice was low and calm, but I’d known her long enough I could see the fear and anger simmering beneath that facade.

“I know!” She took a deep breath. “I know this is all my fault, and I’m sorry. Nothing like this has ever happened before. Nothing! I’ve done twenty videos like this, explored even more places, and _nothing_ _ever happened_.” Her voice rose and rose until it broke and she turned away.

There was a long, terrible moment of silence.

Then, Cary cleared his throat. “So what you’re saying is that not even the dead can resist my charms.”

It wasn’t clever. It wasn’t even all that funny. Still, Dawn huffed a laugh, and some of the tension left her shoulders. Left Mary Anne, too. She slumped into me, resting her head on my shoulder for a moment, and then straightened.

“I hope we at least got it on tape,” she said. Dawn turned to look at her, eyes wide, mouth open. Mary Anne flashed her a tight smile. “Otherwise, no one is going to believe us.”

“All these years,” Dawn said, voice low and shaky. “All these years, and I finally saw a ghost.” She shook her head, touched her fingers to her cheek, right below the cut. “And now I never want to see one again.”  
  
*

Explaining things to our parents was difficult, especially because we had to show them the tape, so there was no way to hide that we’d driven hours away with a couple of boys without telling anyone. At first, everyone was too grateful that we were alive to be angry, and then too confused by our story and the shaky, blurry video.

Eventually, though, the shit hit the fan. I was grounded. Mary Anne was grounded. Dawn, who was leaving for California in a day, was grounded here  _and_ out there. Cary was grounded, and also we all got a long talk from his ex-cop dad. Alan was not grounded, but his car was taken away. (Mine was, too, for an entire month. I was not looking forward to riding the bus from my neighborhood all the way to SHS again.)

But we were alive, and our wounds healed, and even though no one believed we’d actually dealt with a ghost, we knew the truth. (They wrote it off as some guy who’d been living there, hiding from the world, and freaked out when a bunch of teenagers showed up to party. Because of course we were there to party, though we hadn’t had any alcohol or drugs with us. We even had blood tests done. Nothing.

“I would _never_ drink and drive,” I grumbled to my mom at one point. “I’m more responsible than that.”

She stroked my hair. “I know, honey, but you did take off without telling anywhere where you were going. You got hurt. Other people got hurt. That wasn’t very responsible of you.”

I couldn’t even argue with her.)

My grounding was up before I got my car back, and riding the bus was terrible. Worse on the way home, because I was exhausted after practice, and the late bus went all over town dropping people off, so it took forever.

The third week, Cary showed up outside the locker room after practice. “Want a ride, Thomas?” he asked.

I looked at him for a long moment. We hadn’t talked much since that night. None of us had. It was too weird, and we needed time to take the edges off our terror. I’d almost started to believe everyone else was right and we’d been attacked by an actual living person -- until I remembered the way I’d seen the line of the cabin through its back.

“Yeah,” I said, aiming for casual. I was tired enough I couldn’t really be nervous, so probably I managed it. “That’d be great.”

My hair was wet from my shower, and every muscle in my body ached from practice, but there was a weird twist in my stomach when I climbed into his car. He rarely drove it, mostly rode around with Alan, and I took my time checking it out. It was worn but clean, and smelled of cotton, not that nasty fake pine scent a lot of people used.

He turned up the radio, and we rode across town without talking, but when he pulled into my driveway, he turned off the car and killed the music. Turned to face me.

“I’m glad you’re okay,” he said, which was not what I expected.

I shrugged. “You too.”

“You --” He stopped, shook his head. Went on in a rush. “You saved my life, Thomas.”

His discomfort made me grin. I punched his shoulder, though I was tired enough I pulled most of the strength from it. “You weren’t doing too bad,” I told him.

Then, before things got even weirder between us, I scooted across the bench seat and kissed him. It was even better here, warm and safe in his car, both hands free to touch him. He slid his arms around me, splayed his hands across my back, and kissed me, too. Hard.

Maybe I would start believing in ghosts, or maybe I’d convince myself that what happened had been a weird fluke with a rational explanation. Maybe I’d have more big adventures with my friends before graduation, if I could go back to never being grounded. Maybe I’d end up real friends with Cary. Maybe we’d even go on a date.

I didn’t know what was going to happen, and for the moment, that was okay.

What I did know was this: I really liked kissing him.


End file.
